Guns seized from Arizona agency site after director fired

Bob Christie, Associated Press

Updated 8:16 pm, Thursday, December 1, 2016

PHOENIX (AP) — The ousted director of Arizona's social services agency had the department amass 45 handguns and nearly 85,000 rounds of ammunition as he planned to boost his internal security force, the agency's interim director said Thursday.

State troopers confiscated the guns on Nov. 23, less than an hour after Jeffries was forced to resign by Gov. Doug Ducey's chief of staff and escorted from the Capitol DES offices. Troopers then followed Jeffries to his Scottsdale home to confiscate his state-purchased weapon.

Darwin said having the head of a state agency focused on providing services to the poor, aged and ill carrying a gun and badge "does seem strange, yes."

Jeffries has no listed phone number and couldn't be reached by The Associated Press. He told the Republic that the agency had the weapons because it needed to protect its employees, pointing to last year's terrorist attack on a social services center in San Bernardino, California, that killed 14 people.

"These jihadists in San Bernardino attacked a social service center for the developmentally disabled. They will go anywhere," Jeffries told the Republic. "As a director, one of my highest priorities was to protect my people and my clients. I stand by that with pride."

Four of the other five employees who were fired last week also had state-owned handguns confiscated when they were terminated. State troopers were present to provide security.

The Arizona Republic first reported in Thursday's editions that the agency had amassed the weapons and that they were confiscated by the Department of Public Safety.

Darwin said the state police agency will assume oversight of 44 armed DES investigators and security officers. He said troopers were called because he didn't know how to deal with an agency such as DES with a cache of weapons.

Darwin said having the agency buy guns actually made sense once he understood that Jeffries planned to hire staff to replace contracted security officers.

Jeffries was let go after months of news stories by the Republic and other news organizations detailing hundreds of firings at the state's largest agency, which has more than 7,000 employees and administers dozens of social service programs including unemployment insurance, child support and food stamps.

He was hired by Ducey in February 2015 with no government experience and the Republican governor steadfastly backed him until Nov. 21, when he said the news reports had "shaken" his confidence in him. Two days later, Jeffries was gone.

The seizure of the weapons by state troopers wasn't disclosed by the governor's office when it announced to reporters that Jeffries was out of a job. Ducey spokesman Daniel Scarpinato on Thursday refused to say why he waited until The Republic received tips about missing ammunition and began asking questions to acknowledge the issue.

Other state agencies that have law enforcement duties also have sworn officers, including the liquor, gaming and revenue departments. The Arizona attorney general's office has about 50 gun-carrying investigators, spokeswoman Mia Garcia said Thursday.

Jeffries fired more than 500 DES workers. Ducey suspended his ability to fire employees in October and set up a system within the state human resources agency to allow workers to petition to return to their jobs.

As of Tuesday, more than 200 workers had applied for reinstatement, but none have yet been rehired.

Darwin said he was digging into the agency to see what if anything besides the termination practices needs to be changed — there had been no progressive discipline in place or methods to determine the firings were justified.

He said some of the things Jeffries was doing, like visiting each field office and working to improve morale, were "innovative and unique to state government and worth trying."

"The other stuff he was doing that once we became aware of and we substantiated, resulted in his no longer being a state employee," he said.

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